


But the restless tide flowed on

by blackkat



Series: Crossover and Fusion Drabbles [40]
Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: First Meetings, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Canon, Post-Order 66, Rescue
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-04
Updated: 2020-07-04
Packaged: 2021-03-04 20:14:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25072198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blackkat/pseuds/blackkat
Summary: “This is fine,” Hikaru mutters, shoving through the dense jungle as best he can without physically cutting himself a path. A sword isnota machete, and he refuses to use it as one. “No comm, no team, no map, but this isfine.”It's not fine.
Relationships: Hikaru Sulu/Jon Antilles
Series: Crossover and Fusion Drabbles [40]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1145195
Comments: 48
Kudos: 717





	But the restless tide flowed on

**Author's Note:**

> This was technically inspired by a prompt on my Tumblr, but I read it, got an idea in the middle of the night, and wrote out half of this before I realized I'd misremembered the prompt, so. Ah, well. 
> 
> Also I haven't seen the Star Trek movies in...years, and managed to forget about Ben, so. Let's assume this is an AU where Hikaru isn't married.

“This is fine,” Hikaru mutters, shoving through the dense jungle as best he can without physically cutting himself a path. A sword is _not_ a machete, and he refuses to use it as one. “No comm, no team, no map, but this is _fine_.”

A branch springs back, slapping Hikaru straight across the face, and he yelps, stumbles, and overbalances as the soggy earth shifts, then sits down hard, right in a patch of mud.

It’s not fine. Nothing about this is anywhere _close_ to fine.

With a groan, Hikaru shoves himself to his feet, wiping off the mud as best he can, and then futilely checks his comm again. Whatever strange energy signatures were disrupting transmissions earlier are still very present, though, and he sighs and closes it again, stowing it in his pocket. The _Enterprise_ won't leave without him, he’s absolutely sure of that—Jim’s not the type—but Jim _also_ will never let Hikaru forget that he got distracted by plants, wandered away, and got _lost_ on the most impenetrable jungle planet they’ve ever had the fortune to land on.

Well. Jim would call it misfortune, given that he’s allergic to pretty much everything they’ve come into contact with down here. Doctor McCoy has had to stab him with so many hyposprays that Jim has started flinching reflexively whenever Leonard raises his hand. He still hasn’t given up and gone back to the ship, though.

Squinting, Hikaru glances up at the canopy above him, trying to see any hint of sky he can use to navigate, but there aren’t any breaks. Just leaves, and vines, and a few reflective eyes in the shadows that Hikaru is hoping are something small and fluffy and shy. He keeps half an eye on them as he pushes forward, trying not to damage the undergrowth but also determined to get through. Command track at the Academy gave him a pretty decent sense of direction, and he’s more or less assuming this is the way he came, but—he was distracted. The flowers were _interesting_ , and he just wanted to get a few samples, and…

Next time, he’ll make Pavel follow him. Pavel knows when to grab him by the collar and drag him back to the rest of the away party, after almost four years serving together. Even if he’s bored, it will be better than Hikaru getting _lost_.

Jim would probably say _at least it can’t get any worse_ at this point, Hikaru thinks wryly. And then something big and mean with a lot of teeth would leap out of the bushes and try to eat them. _He’s_ not about to test fate, though—this whole situation can _definitely_ get worse—

The ground beneath Hikaru's boots gives way.

With a howl, Hikaru goes crashing through wet earth, down through empty air, then right through another layer of dirt and stone. The world spins, and he catches a half-second glimpse of trailing roots, wishes desperately that Scotty had actually managed to get that jetpack prototype he was talking about last time they drank together working, and grabs. The roots burn his hands, but they slow his fall enough that he can hit the ground on his feet, let the momentum spill him forward into a roll. He crashes spine-first into a wall of stone, with not _nearly_ enough moss on it to cushion the blow, and lies there for a long moment, groaning.

He’s _still_ not going to say it, though. The last thing he needs is a rainstorm to come through and flood the whole damn jungle.

“Ugh,” Hikaru mutters, but he gets his arms under himself, pushes up, and squints into the green-tinted gloom around him.

It’s a building. Some sort of huge, buried building, clearly ancient if it’s managed to get completely buried by the jungle. Shafts of sunlight slant down through gaps in the forest floor above, including the hole Hikaru fell through, and illuminate a vast hallway filled with pillars. There's a thick layer of moss over everything, but when Hikaru climbs to his feet and studies the wall he hit, it’s easy to see the care that was put into the construction. All the blocks are perfectly even, without the roughness of unfinished stone, and he traces his fingers over the joins, not able to feel any sort of cement or filler between them.

Stepping into the quiet hall, Hikaru glances around, taking in its dimensions. Huge, and his footsteps echo unnervingly, even with the cushion of all that moss. There's a long path leading deeper into the building, and Hikaru peers down it for a moment, then turns to look in the other direction and stops dead.

There's a statue. A humanoid, probably female figure kneeling, straight-backed and dressed in robes, with long tentacles coming from her head instead of hair. Her hands are clasped in front of her, around the hilt some kind of staff or sword, and it’s raised high. The look on her face is something fierce, but calm, and Hikaru feels a shiver trace down his spine as he takes a deliberate step back. Something here feels…strange. Heavy, like it’s a little hard to breathe, and even if it’s not hostile, it’s _alien_. And not in the good way. In the _those eyes in the darkness are going to eat me just because they don’t know better_ way.

He makes an executive decision and goes the other direction.

Whatever this building used to be, Hikaru is probably in some sort of main hall. More paths cut away from the main one he’s on, running through the field of pillars, and if he squints at just the right angle Hikaru thinks he can make out doors in the far walls, more hallways leading off. The main path is wide, though, and Hikaru's hoping there's a back door somewhere nearby, maybe a tower he can climb to get back to the surface.

Buildings mean habitation, and even if the ship’s scans only showed animal life, the interference means they can't be _sure_. Jim needs to know there used to be people here, because there might still be.

At the end of the hall is a pair of vast doors, carved wood that was probably grand once. Now it’s worn, faded, one of the doors fallen from its hinges and the other listing. Hikaru edges past them, into a smaller room with a staircase that rises and splits, curving in opposite directions. The left-hand one is broken, a tree growing up through the steps, but the right one seems sturdy enough, and Hikaru picks his way up it a little warily, minding each footfall. Where he’s headed is even brighter than the other hall, the absence of what were probably once windows having left the ceiling almost entirely open, and there's grass growing thick across the walkway here.

It rises sharply, then passes through an arch only to drop again, and Hikaru carefully sidesteps broken stairs as he makes his way down into a particularly lush patch of jungle. It’s easy to see why, once he’s on the ground level again; there are channels for water here, overgrown but still running, and what were probably once fountains. It’s pretty, even grown wild like this, and Hikaru brushes his fingers across the blue-white moss that grows in the bowl of what must have been a small waterfall and keeps moving.

Spock will be fascinated by this place, once Hikaru gets word back to the ship. Statues, and fountains, and such grand architecture—it must have been a temple, or some kind of communal living space. Whoever lived here, they definitely knew how to build to withstand the test of time.

Hikaru thinks of the woman with the tentacle-hair, the strange look on her face, and breathes in. He wonders who existed here, and why they built in the middle of a jungle, and what happened to them, that they abandoned this place with no bodies left, no marks of destruction except for what time has left. It’s a little eerie; the _Enterprise_ doesn’t come across a lot of lost civilizations, and this _feels_ like one. Like something that faded, and disappeared, and now Hikaru is making his way through the last remnant of old grandeur.

He doesn’t stop. It might not be lost, might just have relocated elsewhere as the jungle closed in, and Hikaru needs to warn the ship. He needs to find his way back, too, because he’s the helmsmen; the _Enterprise_ needs him at his post, especially this deep in previously unexplored space. He has a duty, and more than that, the _Enterprise_ is _his_. The whole crew is his. He needs to get back.

Climbing up another set of wide stone stairs, half-covered by a draping tree with trailing branches, Hikaru pushes through another door that stands half-open, warped in its frame. Beyond it, the greenery vanishes, relegated to trees and plants leaning down through the hole in the ceiling. The bare stone is almost a surprise, and Hikaru pauses, glancing back at the fountain room and then forward, to where another door stands closed. If he squints up through the sunlight, he thinks he can see an edge of some sort of tower, slender and tall, and something like relief kicks in his chest.

“If something tries to eat me _now_ , I'm going to stab it,” he warns the universe at large, just in case, and checks his sword is still at his hip, collapsed but ready to draw if he needs it. he probably will, the way this day is going.

When he sets his shoulder to the huge door, though, there's no resistance. It swings open easily, so readily that it almost catches Hikaru off guard, and he staggers a step before he can manage to catch his balance. Looks up, startled, but the door thumps gently against the wall and stays where it is, the simple gilding on it catching the light. It looks like a seal, two raised wings with feathers and then that same sword or staff the statue was holding between them, extending skyward. Hikaru traces his fingers over the bottom edge of it, frowning, but steps into the room.

It’s smaller than all the others, round and full of light. There are crystals set into the wall, glowing softly in shades of yellow and blue and green, and the shadows fall over a pedestal in the exact center of the space, two meters long and a meter high. It’s pale stone, and there's a piece of cloth draped over the shape on top of it, pale and edged with gold in strange markings. Hikaru takes a step forward, not quite able to help himself, and touches the edge of it.

It’s still soft. It doesn’t crumble under his fingers, the way he half-expects, like it’s not old at all. Concern flickers in Hikaru's chest, and he grips it, pulls—

The white cloth flutters away, and it’s not just cloth, but a robe, with draping sleeves and a wide sash. And beneath it, perfectly still, is a man.

For a moment, Hikaru is frozen, hardly able to breathe. His hand twitches towards his sword, but there's no movement, no reaction. Just a man, face heavily scarred, hair dark, dressed in green-brown robes and with his hands clasped on his chest. The hood is pulled up, the folds of cloth around him carefully laid out, and his skin doesn’t look like it’s decomposing. He looks _alive_ , but Hikaru can't see his chest rising, or his eyes fluttering behind the lids.

It takes a long, long moment, but he reaches out, gently, carefully presses his fingertips to the point where the carotid artery would be in a human. For the first several seconds, there's nothing, but then—

A flicker of a pulse. Just once, there and gone, and it’s like he’s in cryo, in some sort of stasis, just without any sort of stasis pod. Hikaru checks the pedestal, but it looks like plain rock, with no advanced technology, no controls. Just a man, apparently asleep, and a temple falling into disrepair around him.

“Damn it,” Hikaru mutters, blowing out a breath. This is the kind of thing _Jim_ gets into, not Hikaru. Jim showing up with a sleeping man he found in an abandoned temple would be just another Tuesday. _Hikaru_ doing that is a hell of a lot less common.

It’s possible Hikaru should get the hell out of here and keep moving, look for a way back to the surface and then bolt for the ship. That option’s tempting, especially after Khan and his people and that whole mess. But—

Hikaru pauses, looking back at the man’s face, peaceful and still. Looks at his scarred hands, clasped loosely around something made of wood and metal. It seems like a hilt, from what Hikaru can see of it, and he reaches out warily, nudges it with a fingertip. Wood banded with metal, and he leans closer, trying to make out what kind of wood it is, because it doesn’t seem like anything that’s come from the trees he’s encountered so far—

The man’s chest rises, falls, rises again, and Hikaru jerks his head up just in time to see pale blue eyes slide open.

He freezes, alarm sending his heartbeat crashing forward into a rabbit-quick pace, but he can't move, can't jerk back. The man isn't making any sudden moves, either, just staring upwards for a long, long moment before he closes his eyes, lets out a breath, and then turns his head and opens them again, looking right at Hikaru.

“Shit,” is the only reaction Hikaru can manage.

Slowly, carefully, the man studies him, then gets an elbow beneath himself. When he pushes up, though, his breath catches hard, like he’s in pain, and his other hand goes to his chest as a grimace crosses his face.

Hikaru can't help it; moving to help him is sheer instinct. He steps closer, gets an arm behind his shoulders to take his weight, and eases him upright. “Easy,” he says, a little helpless, and the man makes a soft sound, splaying a hand across the fold of his robes. His fingers dig in, pull down, and Hikaru's own breath catches as the spiderweb of angry scars comes clear. There are others, but—this one looks like something that’s not survivable, even if it happened in the middle of Sickbay.

“Fay,” the man rasps, and grips Hikaru's arm like an entreaty. “Fay was here, where is she?”

“There's no one else here,” Hikaru says, and then realizes, belatedly, that it’s not his comm translating. The man’s speaking a language he understands, but—there's a lag. Like a dubbed movie, or something, where the new audio lags just a fraction of a second behind the original. That’s—alarming, in a way Hikaru can't even begin to put into words.

For a moment, the man is silent. He looks at Hikaru for a moment, pale eyes scanning his face, his uniform, the sword on his belt, and then says, “You're not a Jedi.”

That word, at least, Hikaru has no idea about. “Jedi?” he asks. “Is that who used to live here?”

“Here,” the man repeats, and then his eyes widen. He slides his legs over the edge of the pedestal, staggers upright and then almost falls, and Hikaru only just manages to catch him in time. He grabs Hikaru in return, an edge of desperation in his face as he asks, “How long has it been? Did the Empire find us? Find the Temples?”

“Hey, easy,” Hikaru says, as gently as he’s able, and hauls the guy up, slinging his arm over Hikaru’s shoulders. “It’s been—a long time, probably. The whole place is jungle now.”

Incomprehension flickers over the man’s face, then twists, something between grief and joy rising before he ducks his head, hiding the emotion behind the fall of his hood. “It worked,” he rasps, and his fingers tighten on Hikaru's arm where it’s wrapped around his waist. “We hid them.”

Something prickles sharply down Hikaru's spine. “Hide _what_?” he asks warily. “From _who_?”

The man looks up, and he’s not smiling, but there's something tired and triumphant on his face. “The Temples,” he says. “The first four Temples, and the planets they're on. All the collected knowledge of the Jedi Order, safe from the Empire’s purge.”

Well. _That_ sounds pleasant, Hikaru thinks, and the shiver of unease is sliding towards true alarm. “You hid whole _planets_?” he asks. “But—we found this one, and the system was obvious—”

The man shakes his head, cutting Hikaru off. “Hid them in the Force,” he says. “And from scanners. No ships would have realized what was on the planet as they passed, even if they came this deep into the Unknown Regions.”

“Force,” Hikaru repeats, practically able to hear the capital letter in there. “You mean, like, mass times acceleration?”

That gets him a strange look, like _he’s_ the one being weird and incomprehensible here. “The Force,” the man repeats, and raises a hand.

The sword detaches from Hikaru's belt and floats up under its own power to hover at eye level.

“Right,” Hikaru says, maybe a little weakly. “Telekinesis. Of course. And—the language thing. Telepathy? You're a psy? Like, actually realized?”

The man blinks at him for a moment. “I have no idea what that means,” he says.

“Join the club,” Hikaru mutters. “ _I_ have no idea what _this_ means, except I really need to contact the captain.”

There's a hesitation, and then a breath. “Did you find the others?” the man asks. “Three other systems, equidistant from here on the hyperspace route—”

“ _Hyperspace_?” Hikaru asks. “I’m going to assume that’s not just a fancy term for warp speed.”

Turning a bemused look on him, the man asks, “How do you get anywhere in time if you're using the speed of light as the basis for your travel?”

Hikaru's head hurts. “We haven’t found anyone else,” he says, because that question at least is easy to answer. “This is the first system we found with planets that have a breathable atmosphere, but we haven’t gone very deep into the quadrant yet. There are more of you?”

“Three more Jedi Masters,” the man says. “And three more Temples.” He lowers his hand, and the sword neatly hooks itself back to Hikaru's belt. “Fay brought me here, and helped me put myself in a trance, and—”

He pauses, staring at the pool of white fabric on the ground. It’s the robe that Hikaru pulled off of him, too small for a man his size, and Hikaru feels something flicker in his chest. Leaning down, he picks it up, and offers it to the man. “Fay?” he asks.

Carefully, almost reverently, the man takes the robe, tangling his fingers in it. “Master Fay,” he says, rough, and closes his eyes. “She was—it was her plan, to save what was left of the Order. Hers and Master Jocasta Nu’s. They got the information out, and located the oldest Temples.”

“She and, uh, Master Nu are guarding two of the other temples?” Hikaru asks, trying to put the pieces together. “In trances? Like you were?” Earth has very, very old stories about monks who could put themselves into trances to survive extreme cold, or a lack of food, but—Hikaru's never heard of it used to keep someone alive for what must have been _centuries_.

“No,” the man says, soft, and looks away. “Master Nu stayed behind, to try and recover the last few texts from the main Temple on Coruscant. She never came back.”

“Oh.” _Purge_ is a hell of a word, especially in the context of a whole order full of people, and the image of this man and others trying desperately to save the last remnants of it makes Hikaru's chest ache. Maybe it’s the scholar in him, but—the idea of lost knowledge hurts worse than anything.

The man shakes his head, then carefully pulls away from Hikaru. He sinks down on the edge of the pedestal, still clutching Fay's robe, and says, “I’m sorry. Jedi Master Jon Antilles.” Careful of his chest, he brings his hands together and bows, and Hikaru pauses, not sure if he should bow back, but—it can't hurt, right?

“Lieutenant Hikaru Sulu, helmsman of the _Enterprise_ ,” he says. “We’re an exploratory and science vessel from the United Federation of Planets, on a mission of discovery.”

“It’s an honor to meet you, Lieutenant Sulu,” Jon says, still quiet, and he takes a breath. “You’ve seen no remnants of the Empire?”

Hikaru shakes his head. “This is the only inhabited planet we’ve found in months,” he says with a shrug. “If there's an Empire out here, we’ve completely missed it. And since we normally run headlong into every possible trouble there is to hit, I'm going to say there's no Empire.”

Just faintly, Jon's mouth curves. It lightens the lines of his face, warms the pale blue of his eyes into something less unnerving, and he nods, then pulls himself fully up onto the pedestal, crossing his legs beneath himself. “You have a way to communicate with your ship?” he asks.

“In theory,” Hikaru says, a little bemused at himself. He’s not normally one to get distracted by a pretty face, but—well. It’s not every day he wakes up a sleeping telepath in a forgotten temple. He can probably be excused, just this once. “But the energy signals around this planet…”

Jon's not listening. Jon has his eyes closed, his hands folded together in his lap, and there's a strange _sense_ around him, like there’s something just beyond the visible spectrum that’s wrapped around him. The air doesn’t quite shimmer, but it feels heavy, like it was around the statue in the first hall. And—

With a crackle, Hikaru's comm comes to life, and he jerks it out of his pocket, flipping it open. “—Sulu,” Uhura’s voice says. “Lieutenant Sulu, can you hear me?”

“Loud and clear, Lieutenant Uhura,” Hikaru says, and there's a sound of relief over the comm, a murmur of voices too muffled to catch.

An instant later, a faint scuffle sounds, and Jim says, “Sulu! The energy signatures just vanished, we can beam you up—”

“Yes, sir,” Hikaru says, eyeing Jon. “I found the source of them. Any chance you can beam him up, too?”

There's a moment of startled silence, and then Jim says, “Report, Mister Sulu,” in his Captain’s Voice.

Hikaru maybe rolls his eyes a little. It’s fine. No one can tell except for Jon, and he’s watching Hikaru with a faintly raised brow. “A survivor of some kind of multi-system empire that sounds like bad news, sir. He was in self-imposed stasis when I found him. I think he might have valuable information if we want to go any further into this area.”

For a long moment, Jim doesn’t answer. Then, carefully, he asks, “You’re not hurt, Sulu?”

“No, sir,” Hikaru says honestly. Hesitates for a moment, and then says, “He’s a psy. I think.”

Jim snorts, and thankfully he sounds amused more than anything else. “No more comments about me getting into trouble,” he says. “All right, we’ll beam you both up. Stand together so Scotty can get a lock.”

“I know how transporters work. Sir,” Hikaru says, maybe a little annoyed, and tips his head at Jon. “Jon—Master Antilles?”

“Just Jon is fine,” he says, and slides down from the pedestal, draping Fay's robe over his arm. His boots are completely soundless on the stone as he crosses to Hikaru's side. “Can you take me to the other temples? I should wake the others, if the Empire is really gone. And…see if there's anything left of the Republic.”

Knowing there was a Republic before there was an Empire is enough to make Hikaru wince. He’s studied enough history to guess at what happened there, especially if an order was purged right after that Empire rose. “It’s been a long time, probably,” he warns quietly.

Jon's smile is very small, resigned, tired. “I know,” he says, and looks around the room, out the door to where the jungle is clearly visible. “I can't feel any trace of the Jedi anymore.”

“On the planet, you mean?” Hikaru asks, morbidly curious, and is mostly unsurprised when Jon shakes his head.

“In the galaxy,” he corrects, and Hikaru winces.

“I'm sorry,” he says helplessly, but Jon just shakes his head and steps closer.

“The Order fell,” he says. “The days of the Jedi ended. We knew that when the Empire rose.” Taking a breath, he ducks his head a little, hiding behind his hood, and then asks, “Is your ship sending a shuttle?”

“You travel by _shuttle_?” Hikaru asks. Teases. It’s a pathetic attempt to lighten the mood. “How do you get anywhere on time?”

To his surprise, Jon snorts, and when he raises his head, there's humor sliding across his expression. “So that’s how it is?” he asks.

“You asked,” Hikaru says, unruffled, and offers his arm. “First time beaming is always disorienting. You can hang on to me, if you want.”

It’s a little gratifying that Jon doesn’t even hesitate. He curls his hands around Hikaru's arm, shifting closer, and Hikaru only pauses for a moment before he presses his free hand over Jon's.

“We’ll find them,” he says, a little awkwardly, and feels Jon's inhale just as the familiar tingling rush of the transporter starts.

“Thank you,” Jon says softly, and then the planet disappears in a wash of glittering light, reforming into the familiar transporter bay, with Scotty behind the controls. He’s grinning, relieved, and Hikaru grins back, then deftly catches Jon as he staggers.

“Lieutenant,” Scotty says. “Stealing the captain’s thunder now, are you?”

“Not on _purpose_ ,” Hikaru protests, and helps Jon upright. “You okay, Jon?”

“That’s worse than teleporting,” Jon says with a grimace.

“ _Teleporting_?” Scotty asks, startled.

At this point, Hikaru is just. Rolling with it. Teleportation? Cool. He’ll have to ask Jon to show him at some point. “You get used to it. Come on, the captain is—”

“Outside,” Jon says, and three seconds later the door slides open.

Jim looks from Jon, to Scotty, who’s still staring at their guest, to Hikaru, and it looks like he’s fighting a grin. And the urge to waggle his eyebrows. “Welcome back, Sulu,” he says. “You have fun?”

Hikaru rolls his eyes. “I'm taking Jon to Sickbay,” he says with all the dignity remaining to him. “And then I’ll debrief you, sir.”

“Bones is going to _love_ this,” Jim says, with all the glee of a man who’s been stabbed by hyposprays on the regular for over four years now, and gets his revenge the only way he can.

Well. If Jim is coming, then at least Leonard will yell at _him_ and not at Hikaru. With a sigh, Hikaru helps Jon down the steps, and tells him, “Just a basic checkup and then we’ll start looking for the other survivors.”

Jon looks mostly resigned to this. “Medics don’t tend to like me,” he says.

Given how many scars he has, and the fact that he apparently survived some kind of genocide, Hikaru is pretty sure Leonard is going to wrap him up in a blanket and force-feed him hot tea, but he doesn’t say that. “You’ll be fine,” he offers instead. “Doctor McCoy’s bark hides a gooey marshmallow center, I promise. And I’ll stick around, just in case.”

“Thank you,” Jon says, and Hikaru grins at him.

“I woke up the sleeping beauty in his tower,” he says. “I think that means by fairy tale rules I'm obligated to stay close.”

Jon blinks at him, and Hikaru pauses, realizing that he’s probably going to have to explain the metaphor. Just as he opens his mouth, though, Jon flushes pink, ducking his head beneath his hood, and—

Fuck him, but it’s _adorable_.

Mildly blindsided by this realization, Hikaru almost walks into the door. Of _course_. And Jim is even there to see it.

It’s just that kind of day.


End file.
